| Mike Connors  AKA Krekor Ohanian
Born: 15-Aug-1925
Birthplace: Fresno, CA
Died: 26-Jan-2017
Location of death: Tarzana, CA
Cause of death: Cancer - Leukemia
Gender: Male
Race or Ethnicity: White
Sexual orientation: Straight
Occupation: Actor Nationality: United States
Executive summary: Mannix Military service: US Army Air Corps (WWII) Mike Connors is best known for playing the title role in Mannix, a two-fisted TV detective show with a snappy theme song. Mannix had a knack for one-liners, and a bad habit of getting pistol-whipped by thugs when he came too close to unraveling each week's mystery.
In high school Connors played basketball, receiving the nickname "Touch" for playing tight defense. He attended UCLA on a basketball scholarship, and was approached after a ball game by William A. Wellman, who told him he had an actor's expressive face and suggested he call RKO. Billed as Touch Connors, his first film was the noir classic Sudden Fear with Joan Crawford and Jack Palance. He made several films with low-budget master Roger Corman, including Swamp Woman with Marie Windsor, and Five Guns West with Dorothy Malone.
In 1967 Connors began playing Mannix. Like Connors, Mannix was of Armenian extraction, and would occasionally offer pithy sayings in fluent Armenian. Gail Fisher played Mannix's secretary, winning an Emmy in the role, the first black actress so honored. Its theme was composed by Lalo Schifrin, who also scored Mission: Impossible and The Man from U.N.C.L.E. In at least ten separate episodes, Mannix frustrated the network censors by decorating the sets with tasteful nude paintings, or filming scenes in front of a statue of a naked woman. The censors could not see the nudity coming in the scripts, and they could not easily edit out the art after the shows had been filmed. Mannix thus effected a change whereby network censors now visit the sets of shows.
After Mannix, Connors was in charge of Today's FBI and hosted Crimes of the Century. He took two cruises on The Love Boat and was the special guest star on three of Angela Lansbury's Murder She Wrotes. And he played an aging Joe Mannix on an episode of Dick Van Dyke's Diagnosis Murder.
Wife: Mary Lou Wiley (two children)
Son: Matthew Connors (b. circa 1958)
Daughter: Dana Connors (b. circa 1960)
University: University of California at Los Angeles
Golden Globe 1970 for Mannix
Phi Delta Theta Fraternity
Armenian Ancestry
Endorsement of Jim Beam 1973
Risk Factors: Smoking
TELEVISION
Tightrope Nick Stone (1959-60)
Mannix Joe Mannix (1967-75)
FILMOGRAPHY AS ACTOR
Nobody Knows Anything! (2003) · Joe Mannix
Gideon (10-Oct-1999) · Harland Greer
War and Remembrance (13-Nov-1988)
Too Scared to Scream (4-Jan-1985)
Nightkill (18-Dec-1980) · Wendell Atwell
Casino (1-Aug-1980)
Avalanche Express (27-Sep-1979)
Stagecoach (22-Apr-1966)
Kiss the Girls and Make Them Die (1966)
Situation Hopeless... But Not Serious (13-Oct-1965)
Harlow (23-Jun-1965)
Where Love Has Gone (2-Nov-1964) · Maj. Luke Miller
Good Neighbor Sam (22-Jul-1964) · Howard Ebbets
Panic Button (Apr-1964)
Live Fast, Die Young (Apr-1958)
Suicide Battalion (Feb-1958)
Voodoo Woman (1-Mar-1957)
Swamp Women (16-Nov-1956) · Bob Matthews
Shake, Rattle & Rock! (Nov-1956)
The Ten Commandments (5-Oct-1956)
The Oklahoma Woman (15-Jun-1956)
Day the World Ended (Dec-1955)
The Twinkle in God's Eye (13-Oct-1955)
Five Guns West (18-Apr-1955)
Island in the Sky (5-Sep-1953) · Gainer
The 49th Man (12-May-1953)
Sudden Fear (6-Aug-1952) · Junior Kearney
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